Friday, February 17, 2006

MORE GITMO CONTROVERSY

A recent UN report criticizes the US over the treatment of detainees at Guantanamo Bay.

The 54-page report also urged the immediate shutdown of the prison complex. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said the detention facility would have to be closed "sooner or later ... hopefully as soon as is possible."

"The United States government should either expeditiously bring all Guantanamo Bay detainees to trial ... or release them without further delay," read the UN Commission on Human Rights report.

As hard as this is to believe, I sincerely doubt that the UN has the best interest of the US in mind. And I can't, for the life of me, recall mass trials for all of the Axis POW's during WW II. If I recall correctly, we held onto those guys until the end of the war.

For some perspective on the issue from someone who has a clue, check out Mike Gifford's column at Defensewatch.

There's a fact that everyone needs to wake up to--the men we've detained at Gitmo are not common soldiers. They aren't conscripts fighting as soldiers in an Army that were captured in some obscure battle, like so many of the Iraqi soldiers you saw surrender en masse during war. These people are out to bring down the United States at all costs, and often have information that can help destroy the network that's out to destroy us. They will never fight by the same rules we do, and they know how to use our rules of warfare against America, Britain or anyone they consider an enemy. (5) We're not the bad guys here--they are--but in our panic to be completely fair, I'm afraid we're going to make deadly and potentially irreversible concessions.